As you know, school attendance is an incredibly important facet of school life. Regardless of attendance being a legal requirement, at St Martins School we believe that regular attendance not only increases learning time, but builds resilience, confidence and a solid work ethic that will help your children navigate the world that awaits them after school.

Attendance at school is a legal requirement, and as members of our school community, it is fair to have high expectations concerning attendance and to expect that everyone makes the effort to make sure their children attend school each day. Parents/carers should ring in every day for which a child is absent from school, communicating the reason for this absence.

School attendance is always the responsibility of parents and carers, but here at St Martins, we want to make sure that all families have the support they need. In order that we can work together as a team it may be useful for you to have an awareness of the processes we go through in school to support high attendance.

Class teachers (Primary) and form tutors (Secondary) will meet with pupils to discuss any barriers to good attendance and seek to agree some strategies for improvements on an ‘Attendance Action Plan’, putting in place any support which may be identified. Every week, I meet with our Educational Welfare Officer (EWO) to discuss attendance registers, and any students whose attendance is falling below 95%; we will share the ‘Attendance Action Plan’ with our EWO.

At St Martins School we request that your children do not miss unnecessary days when they are not genuinely ill, for reasons such as tiredness or having a cold. If your child is genuinely poorly then do not send them in. If you are unsure, send them to school and we can make a judgement during the day.  We have seen an increase in term-time holidays post-pandemic, which is understandable considering the disruption of the past 2 years. This year, however, term-time holidays will not be authorised by school. Only 1 day of absence will be authorised for weddings or funerals.

Punctuality in addition to attendance is equally important. To clarify students are expected to arrive at school at the times below.

Students who arrive after registers close are marked as a ‘U’ which technically records a student as missing the morning session, which is half a day’s absence. A student arriving at school every day at this time would only record an attendance of 50%.

 You may be called in for a support meeting in accordance with our procedures.  If you are not in this group and would like to discuss your child/ward’s attendance further, or have any concerns regarding their attendance, please get in touch to arrange a meeting.